- Banks deposit 244.5bn euros overnight at ECB
- Weak German import and export data
- Italian banks downgraded

FTSE-100: 0.15%
Dax-30: -0.16%
Cac-40: 0.17%
FTSE Mibtel 30: 0.37%
Ibex 35: -0.09%
Stoxx 600: -0.01%

European stocks are moving back into the blue following an earlier start slightly lower. That following the small losses seen on Wall Street overnight and cautious remarks out from some Chinese policy makers.

Weaker than forecast German export data was surely another factor weighing on European shares early in the session. Even so, this is what economists at Barclays Research were saying, "We therefore believe that the recent weakness in German trade figures is mainly the lagged response to the slowdown in global growth that occurred earlier in 2012. Despite the recent weakness, however, Germany's trade performance in 2012 through November has been much better than expected at the beginning of last year."

Those economists also seem to have given short shrift to the drop seen in imports.

All of the above comes ahead of the start of the regular earnings season, Stateside, later today, with Alcoa's results.

Italian banks downgraded

Airbus has been selected as the preferred bidder to supply six A330 aerial refueling tankers to India. As well, Hawaiian Airlines plans to buy Airbus A321-neo planes in an order valued at up to $2.8bn.

Novartis will limit acquisition deals to $4bn in 2013 Chief Executive Joe Jimenez told Bloomberg.

The board of Generali, Italy's biggest insurer, is to discuss buying the 49% of a joint venture with Czech group PPF it does not already own, three sources with knowledge of the situation told Reuters.

Verizon Communications could bid for Vodafone's stake in their joint-venture, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Intesa Sanpaolo and Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena have both been downgraded by JPMorgan Chase & Co., to underperform from neutral.

From a sector stand-point the best performance is now to be seen in the following industrial groups: Telecommunications (0.83%), Health Care (0.39%) and Banks (0.27%).

Weak German import and export data
Italian unemployment remained at an 11.1% rate in November (Consensus: 11.2%).

France's trade deficit improved to -€4.33bn in November, following a reading of -€4.71bn in the previous month (Consensus: -€4.8bn).

Germany's trade surplus shrank in that same month, to €14.6bn from €15.2bn in October (Consensus: €15bn). The country's exports fell by 3.4% month-on-month (Consensus: -0.5%). Imports decreased by a similarly large 3.7%, which may denote underlying weakness in the economy.

Switzerland's unemployment rate rose to 3.3% for December, after a reading of 3.1%.

Slight drop in the single currency
The euro/dollar is now falling by 0.05% to the 1.3120 dollar mark.

Front month Brent crude futures are up by 0.589 dollars to the 112.09 level on the ICE.



AB

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